Somewhere Past the Setting Sun
by sentbyfools
Summary: Canon Divergence AU, where s3 ended without any new issues and life went on. Emma finds herself at the Baelfire Home, the Storybrooke Orphanage, more often than not because of h e r. It'd be a nuisance, if she didn't enjoy it so much.


**Title: **somewhere past the setting sun

**Summary: **She has wild, curly hair and a pretty open smile.

**Notes: **captainswans started this, and lydiamaartin basically wrote this whole thing and I just put it to paper. Blame them. Part 1 in this Canon-Divergence AU starting from s3 finale if Elsa & Frozen didn't happen, and calm happened instead.

* * *

She has wild, curly hair and a pretty, open smile, and Emma has to blink rapidly before she regains her composure enough to ask "the questions."

At every new foster home and orphanage and Residential Treatment Center (what the adults, doctors, and agents who "only want to help you, Emma," called it; "never again" and "the last straw" were Emma's names for them), the same questions always came up whether from a potential friend, unknowingly ruining any chance of Emma ever talking to them again, a social worker who hadn't had the time to read her case file, or another inmate swapping tragedies as if they were nothing (they'd seen too much, been in far too many homes and potential parents, who like their own – decided they weren't worth more than a punching bag, a meal ticket – that they didn't matter more than that next high, didn't matter enough to _stay alive_ and for who leaving them at a hospital was too much effort when they could just drop them on the side of the road instead.)

_The Questions._

"How long have you been a ward of the State?"

The girl shrugs her small shoulders nonchalantly. She blows a bubble with her purple 25¢ bubble gum that Emma is sure came from the machine in the station (and hasn't been refilled ever? Maybe?) and pops it before she responds with a tilt of her head, "Regina killed my parents. Or Rumplestiltskin. Or the ogres. I don't know which, so take your pick. They're dead. Dead is dead."

It's not an answer. There's a notepad in front of Emma with spaces for her to fill in, but Emma doesn't touch it. The pen lies on her desk, unmoved since the nuns brought her in and whispered to Emma in concerned tones while the 11 year old topic of discussion sat at David's desk, flipping through the newly installed satellite channels until she found Power Rangers. They'd given Emma "The Questions," the pen with _Baelfire Home_ emblazoned on the side (Emma's eyes had watered then too; an old habit), and called her into the room and now here they are on question two.

"What kind of home are you looking for?"

Young, orphan Emma would've sobbed and said, "I just want my parents." Older, pre-teen Emma would've held the tears at bay and said, "I just want to live some place where someone loves me." Angry, teen Emma would've squeezed her hands into fists and snapped for them "to stop asking me what I want when you and I both know I'm not gonna get it." Teen, runaway in love with Neal Cassidy would've thought of all the times she'd been asked that question and laughed, said to Neal, "Who needs a home when I have you?" before he kissed her like a promise. The Emma chained to a hospital bed would've turned her face into the pillow and cried as they took Henry away and prayed that he would find a perfect home because there was none to be found with her.

Ask the Emma waiting for the girl's response that question, and she'll say, "I don't need to look anymore. I've found it."

– But maybe her voice will tremble with a hint of uncertainty, and maybe she'll hate herself just a tiny bit more for having everything she ever wanted and thought she'd never have, for being truly happy for the first time, and yet, still craving more –

The girl kicks her short legs against the front of Emma's desk. Emma stares at her, waiting because _Emma_ has a million and one answers to that question, but she's 31 years old with wonderful parents, a perfect son, an adorable baby brother named Graham who can steal hearts better than Regina, and a one-handed pirate captain with a love for rum and crepes – this is not her question to answer anymore.

The silence stretches on a moment longer until the girl twists a curl around her finger and says, a wrinkle in her nose, "With a sheriff's salary, I'm not sure you'd even be able to _comprehend_ my tastes."

Emma goes through a number of responses from "You're 11, not a Disney Channel show character," to "What the hell?" to "I'm not _that_ poor," to "What THE HELL?" and what she finally blurts out, leaning across the table and knocking over her half-drunk coffee onto the forms she hasn't touched, is, "I'm the _Savior_."

The girl raises an eyebrow, grins, before dissolving into giggles. Emma stares, frozen by her dumb response (like _what the hell does __**that**__ prove? That doesn't even __**pay**_) and the way she finds herself wanting to giggle too – but then the wetness soaks through the thin sleeve of her shirt. She scrambles to clean it up while struggling to keep her expletives PG.

Emma bends to clean where the coffee dripped down the side of her desk when the pitter-patter of sneakered feet racing down the halls makes her look up to the open door and curse again, R-Rated verging on NC Allowed Ever.

"She'll run away any chance she gets," Aliya, the fairy nun who had golden wings growing out of her habit, had warned, and Emma had scoffed, "I can handle an 11 year old."

She puts the call into David to pick up the little girl and bring her back to Baelfire Home and doesn't let herself rest until David calls back and says that he and "Sneakmaster?" (The question mark is all David; Emma knows her dad's bemused tone like she knows Henry's puppy eyes: far too well) are headed to meet Blue.

Emma thanks him, hangs up, and seats herself at her now dry desk to look at the coffee stained forms.

They never even got to question 3.

_A follow up visit to the Home. Just to finish the questionnaire. A Sheriff's duty to her citizens._

She bites her lip and draws her hand around the shoelace on her wrist.

_Besides_ – her gaze drawn back to the top of the form, the ID label carefully stuck to the top like they often have to print these – _Code Name: Kid's Next Door is __**not**__ a name._


End file.
